AskPat 2.0: A Weekly Coaching Call on Online Business, Blogging, Marketing, and Lifestyle Design

Today's question comes from Bill, who has a question about engagement and traffic from podcast show notes. How much engagement and traffic do I get from my show notes? Could he get away with skipping show notes? What should he include in his show notes? What resources can he use to manage his show notes? Bill's website is at http://www.podcastbyfriday.com/. Do you have a question about creating sh...

Today's question comes from Jennifer, who has a question about building a successful mastermind group. What is the best structure of a mastermind group? What kinds of topics should they discuss? How can they best leverage each other? Jennifer's website is at http://www.sideofincome.com/. In this episode, I mention my webinar replay on How to Build a Winning Mastermind Group. You can watch that at...

Today's question comes from Barry, who has a question about Kevin Kelly's 1,000 True Fans (http://kk.org/thetechnium/1000-true-fans/). How does he identify which of his fans are his true fans? What's the best way to follow up with these people? How can he continue to grow his audience more strategically with his true fans? Barry's website is at http://www.turningthepage.info/. In this episode I me...

Today's question comes from Matthew, who has a question about developing routines around online business metrics. Which metrics do I find the most important? Which are my favorite tools for monitoring performance? Do I have any daily, weekly, and monthly routines for analytics? Do I delegate analytics to your team? In this episode, I mention Google Webmaster Tools. Learn more at https://www.google...

Today's question comes from Richard, who has a question about the importance of having a relevant college degree for the type of industry blog you run. Should he have a Bachelor Degree in Sport Science to run a successful lifestyle and fitness blog? Will his audience care about his background in education? If he don't have a relevant degree but does have the relevant knowledge and experience, how...

Today's question comes from Dave, who has a question about how to balance time for fitness and time for kids. How can he fit in time to exercise when he has kids? Do you have tips for young parents who want to find time for healthy activities with kids? Dave's website is at http://www.catholicprotools.com/. In this episode, I mention my Instagram account, where I feature a lot of my health and fit...

Today's question comes from Simone, who has a question about separating auto-responses from real responses in her inbox. How can she make sure that she can easily find and respond to actual responses from her emails? What are some tips she can use to better filter out the auto-responses from the real responses? Simone's website is at http://www.echemusic.com/. Do you have a question about managing...

Today's question comes from Jorge, who has a question about achieving results from affiliate marketing. How does he start building affiliate income? And how can he connect with the Filipino community specifically with my affiliate marketing? Where can he get results from his affiliate marketing? Are there any specific ways to engage his audience to inspire them in his affiliate income building pro...

Today's question comes from Randy, who has a question about promoting his book on his blog. What if he feels like he doesn't have much more to say outside of the book? Should he keep his blog going? What should he write about to promote his book? Randy's website is at http://www.disneylanddevotional.com/. Do you have a question about promoting your book? Record it at http://www.askpat.com/. Thanks...

Today's question comes from Craig, who has a question about reaching out personally to his audience to start growing his email list. What should he include in the email to make an impact? How can he better personalize emails? What should be the ask be in his first email to his audience? Craig's website is at http://www.empowerthetribe.com/. In this episode, I mention my 3-Day Email List Challenge...

Today's question comes from Mike, who has a small Facebook community as a part of his website. There is a similar, much larger Facebook community that is not his where he could also be active and may potentially attract new users to his site. How should he split his time between these groups? Mike's site is http://fermentingfood.uk/. Mike talks about the market map exercise from my book, Will It F...

Today's question comes from Michael, who has a directory of service providers on his website. Should he be charging businesses to get listed in this directory, or should he continue to list people and businesses for free? Michael's site is http://www.emailoverloadsolutions.com/. I talk about the directory on my Green Exam Academy website (http://greenexamacademy.com). Do you have a question about...

Today's question comes from Andres, who is looking for some advice on improving his skills in front of the microphone. I share my advice for leveling up your microphone skills. Do you have a question about podcasting and recording? Record it at http://www.askpat.com/. Thanks to our sponsor today, BambooHR. This online management software will help you manage the human resources tasks for your smal...

Today's question comes from Otis, who asks about Facebook ads. How does he know how much he should spend each month? Otis's site is http://lakecitytactical.com/. Do you have a question about Facebook advertising? Record it at http://www.askpat.com/. Today's sponsor is Freshbooks. Go to http://www.freshbooks.com/askpat and enter "Ask Pat" for more information. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.co...

Today's question comes from Paul, who is planning for an upcoming product launch. Should he consider making the product available for a limited time only? Paul's website is http://photographytv.com/. Paul talks about Smart Passive Income Podcast #162 (https://www.smartpassiveincome.com/session162). Do you have a question about launching a product? Record it at http://www.askpat.com/. Thanks to tod...

Today's question comes from Tim, who asks about rebranding his site, which has grown beyond its original focus. Should he keep the original URL, or migrate his site to a different URL? Tim's site is http://androidpcreview.com/. Tim talks about how I migrated Green Exam Academy from intheleed.com to greenexamacademy.com using 301 permanent redirects. Do you have a question about rebranding a site a...

Today's question comes from Simone, who asks about building a business directory on her website. How can she encourage new businesses to sign up? I've used business directories on my niche site Security Guard Training HQ (http://www.securityguardtraininghq.com/) and share my best advice for getting businesses to sign up. Do you have a question about adding special features to your website? Record...

Today's question comes from Marie, who is building an online course for kids. What is the best tool to use for delivering video and keeping them protected? In this episode, I discuss how I use video on my free podcasting tutorial (http://www.podcastingtutorial.com) versus a paid course like Smart From Scratch. Teachable is a good option if you're looking for a full course platform (http://askpat.c...

Today's question comes from Oz, who has a question about using email autoresponders and landing pages together. How can he make sure that people who are subscribed to one segment get the resources offered by other his other campaigns? Oz is using GetResponse for emails (https://www.getresponse.com/); I recommend and am an advisor for the email service provider ConvertKit (http://askpat.com/convert...

Today's question comes from Andre, who asks about my blog images on the SPI blog. Why do I put both my name and my date on them? Andre's website is http://www.asmallinvestment.com/. Andre is referencing the images you see at the Smart Passive Income blog (http://smartpassiveincome.com/blog). I also discuss how Gary Vaynerchuk manages images (https://www.garyvaynerchuk.com/). Do you have a question...

Today's question comes from Kit, who hasn’t chosen her company name yet. Can she still start a blog without choosing a name? Kit mentions using the lessons from my book Will It Fly? (http://willitflybook.com) to start her business. If you are starting a new website and need website hosting, I recommend Bluehost (http://askpat.com/bluehost). Do you have a question about starting a business? Record...

Today's question comes from Sean, who asks about building traffic to his blog. Which method is best for a new blog: SEO or content marketing? Sean’s site is http://flighttrainingpro.com. I recommend using Yoast SEO WordPress plugin to help you include the correct SEO fields (https://wordpress.org/plugins/wordpress-seo/); All in One SEO Pack is also a good alternative plugin (https://wordpress.org/...

Today's question comes from Jacob, who asks about business structure. Should multiple businesses operate under the same LLC, or should each business have a separate legal entity? The first business I started is Green Exam Academy (formerly called In the LEED; http://www.greenexamacademy.com/). My original LLC is Flynndustries LLC. The other LLC I discuss in depth is related to the Smart Podcast Pl...

Today's question comes from Eric, who lives in Ghana and is looking to build a site teaching others how to start online businesses in Africa. What specifically should he document? Eric's site is http://www.internetbusinessafrica.com/. I share my thoughts on how to get started. Do you have a question about starting an online business? Record it at http://www.askpat.com/. See Privacy Policy at https...

Today's question comes from Jason, who has some questions about setting up a shopping cart for his website. Which is the best one for his needs, with include considerations for shipping physical goods? I recommend checking out ShipStation (http://www.shipstation.com/). A good website platform to check out is Shopify, which is an alternative to WordPress that is designed specifically for online sto...